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Aaah, summer – lounging in a chair, splashing in the water, enjoying life in the sun, relaxing from all the stress of the modern world, listening to such upbeat tunes as You Are My Sunshine.

At least, that’s the way it used to be. Now summer is itself something more to stress out about. The warm, bright, life-giving sun is now to be feared and avoided, and if not, then approached only with an army of sun-screens, sun-blockers and sun-protectors at the ready. We all seem to have all become experts on SPF factors and UV rays. What used to be a simple pleasure has become a guilty pleasure, full of worry and anxiety, particularly for our children. But it doesn’t have to be that way. You can have your cake and eat it too.

Here are a few simple realities:

1. The sun is the source of life, health and longevity.

2. The health benefits of direct sunlight are well-documented in tens of thousands of studies.

3. Even in the case of Vitamin D, a critical element in health, sunlight is the best source by far.

So, why are we so fearful of the sun that we feel we need to protect ourselves against it? In a word: skin cancer, or more precisely (to keep it to one word), melanoma. And yet this widely-known ‘fact’ is a myth.

We cannot live without the sun, and if we armour ourselves against it, our health, and life, suffers.

Sunlight, like all things in life, is subject to two basic rules – you can have too much of a good thing (there is an optimal dose for everything), and how much you can handle depends on your level of health to begin with – the healthier you are the more you can handle. Children learn about the optimal dose early on from Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Baby bear’s bed, porridge and chair, in contrast to those of Mama and Papa Bear, are ‘just right’. Common sense tells us the second is true.

So, the best approach to the sun is to be as healthy as possible, and then you will be able to handle reasonable amounts of direct sunlight without getting burned. If you are not that healthy, then as in all things you have to proceed with more caution. Just as after a surgery or illness, you can’t immediately resume your normal level of activity, you need to ease into direct sunlight slowly, a few minutes at a time. This goes for those who travel to the ‘sun’ spots for vacations. Your body is not yet able to handle the intensity, and 20 minutes a day is enough for the first few days, until you can handle more.

The natural internal radiant energy of your body is able to meet and match the sun’s energy so that it provides all the benefits without any harm. The more radiant energy you provide (‘radiant health’), the more sun you can handle. I am blond-haired and blue-eyed and have been able to handle the sun without any need for sunscreens. Mind you, I follow the old adage, proven by research, that ‘only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noon-day sun.’ This is a good rule of thumb to observe. The sun is most intense between about 11 AM and 2PM generally, and when you are most likely to get too much (‘get burned’). Cultures in more tropical climes developed a way to avoid the sun at this time, called the siesta. You can follow their sage example and stay out of the sun as much as possible during this time. Even when I have occasion to be outside and can’t avoid the sun at those times, I simply wear a hat, which along with shorts and a short-sleeved shirt. The parts that are still exposed don’t get sun-burned and I don’t put anything on except maybe some coconut oil.

Unrefined coconut oil is a great natural way to lessen the effects of the sun (look for USDA Certified Organic or other reliable organic label). Even though it has an SPF factor of ‘only’ 10, that is still enough to block 90% of the UVB rays that are involved in the production of Vitamin D in the body. Coconut oil is also a way to lubricate and hydrate the skin, so I use it if I have to be out in the intense sun, but not otherwise.

If you feel you need to use a commercial sunscreen, here is a site that provides guidance on the best brands.

Remember also that a higher SPF is not really necessary. An SPF of 15 gives you 93% blockage of UVB rays (versus 90% for coconut oil), SPF 30 only 97%, and going to SPF 50 only increases that to 98%. 90% blockage of UVB rays should normally be enough.

If you take one thing from this article today, let it be ‘the sun is life-giving if you use common sense’. Mind you, as my mother used to say, ‘what’s common about it; most people don’t seem to have it’. Let’s hope your healthy tan will show others that you do still have what it takes!

that ‘autism’ is not a true disease, nor a specific disorder? It is simply a label for certain observed physical and psychological symptoms that don’t seem to fit any other box.

The label may provide some sort of psychological relief to the parents (that it is not something ‘more serious’), but often does the contrary, generating stress, as it seems to enlighten without providing any real form of resolution. Autism and Autism Spectrum Disorders are labels that essentially describe a general difficulty in interacting with the outside world and a certain withdrawal into one’s own world. There are as many variations as there are individuals with the label, and the label does nothing to tell you the underlying causes. We seem to live in a world of alphabet soup labels for children – ADD, OCD, ODD, PDD, PDD-NOS, and the list goes on. If we add it all up, with a 1 in 30 incidence of ASD, and a 1 in 10 incidence of ADD (the most commonly ‘diagnosed’ condition) in North America, not to mention all the others, it seems that we are getting close to having somewhere near 1 in 5 children labelled with some form of behavioural, learning or social disorder.

The problem is that these labels lack specificity and different professionals will come to different conclusions as to whether a given label fits or not. Allopathic diagnosis is notoriously difficult in general . When it comes to psychological issues, the capacity to ‘get it right’ becomes even more problematic, as the definitions for each ‘disorder’ is quite general and open-ended. It is a bit like having certain symptoms and then going on-line to find out what they mean only to discover that it could be one of several dozen conditions. Even professionals are not much better at narrowing the uncertainty. In one case we had, the mother felt that her son had ‘recovered’ from autism, but the professional making the ‘diagnosis’ in the first place disagreed. She even went to a different profession, but he concurred that the child was still autistic. I suggested that many professionals suffer from a certain prejudice in what they see based on past labels, and are reluctant to go against them. She then travelled to another city, presented herself and son to a new professional in the field, but this time did not disclose anything about her son, and simply asked for an evaluation. This time, the professional concluded that her son was not autistic – he had some learning issues, but then, said the professional, so did most children in one form or another, himself included!

For Heilkunst, autism itself is not real, but what is real are the various issues, physical or behavioural, that each child may have. What is also real are the underlying causes for these issues. The key is to set up a systematic approach that can get at the complex of causes at many levels in each case. In some cases, vaccinations play a role, in others birth traumas or drugs, emotional shocks, and various inherited weaknesses (some genetic, but most epi-genetic). For most cases, particularly the difficult ones, and the so-called ‘non-responders’, we have to consider all these factors.

Many approaches claim some success in certain cases of autism, such as where the cause is purely a gut dysbiosis, or an overload of toxins. Here therapies aimed at these issues can have a significant effect. But what works for one case, doesn’t work for many, indeed, most others. A one-size fits all approach doesn’t work when the problem is complex. The best approach is one that offers a method for working at a long-term resolution of each individual case based on an assessment of its own particular complex of causes. This method must also be able to distinguish between effects (such as gut inflammation) and cause (such as vaccine shock triggering the gut inflammation). Treating for effects can provide some degree of relief of symptoms (palliation), but generally does not result in fundamental change.

Heilkunst is not a magic solution or quick fix but is an effective system for approaching the complexity of causes of each case and getting consistent results. And yes, it can take time, and even quite some time in the more difficult cases but most would say that it was time well spent.

If you have any questions please contact the Clinic for further assistance at reception@homeopathy.com

If you would like more information regarding Heilkunst and our approach to treatment you can look at the following resources:

This week we interrupt our regularly scheduled program for a special announcement.

We often get asked for specific information about the treatment through Heilkunst of X, Y or Z, whether arthritis, diabetes, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue or any of the various conventionally named conditions.

The answer is the same for all of them. These are almost always a name created to describe the obvious, common symptoms or signs in certain patients. For example, arthritis simply means an inflammation of the joints, and colitis means an inflammation of the colon. These names come from mostly Greek and sometimes Latin roots, so they sound more impressive than they are. Lets take another, fibroymyalgia. The term comes from three Latin and Greek terms meaning pain in the muscle and connective tissue.

Now, the patient already knows he/she has pain. The so-called diagnosis simply now tells the patient that the pain is in the muscles and connective tissue, but does not tell him or her the cause. Indeed, as Wikipedia states, and this is true for most if not all such conditions named by conventional medicine, the cause is unknown and is suspected to be multiple.

Wikipedia: Its exact cause is unknown but is believed to involve psychological, genetic, neurobiological and environmental factors.

Thus, in the face of an unknown, multiple causation, conventional treatment focusses on suppressing the overt symptoms, leaving the cause(s) untouched. Treating for the symptoms themselves is also complex, as they vary from patient to patient, meaning that the ‘diagnosis’ is very general and not specific to an individual patient.

Wikipedia: Fibromyalgia symptoms are not restricted to pain, leading to the use of the alternative term fibromyalgia syndrome for the condition. Other symptoms include debilitating fatigue, sleep disturbance and joint stiffness. Some patients also report difficulty with swallowing, bowel and bladder abnormalities, numbness and tingling, and cognitive disfunction. Fibromyalgia is frequently comorbid with psychiatric conditions such as depression and anxiety and stress-related disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder. Not all fibromyalgia patients experience all associated symptoms.

While any relief to sufferers from symptomatic treatment is understandably welcome, it is usually partial, temporary and often comes with so-called side-effects (really drug induced disease effects or iatrogenic disease). Any treatment tends to be haphazard and random depending on the training and expertise of the practitioner. The old adage is that if all one has is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Heilkunst is not able to treat everything, as life is too complex for that, but it does have a systematic, comprehensive approach to various conditions people are suffering from, such as fibromyalgia (or any other condition one wishes to name) that involves regimenal factors (diet, nutrition, exercise, lifestyle, etc), underlying disease causes (such as physical or emotional shocks and traumas, as well as inherited disease archetypes called chronic miasms), and also the broader realm of soul-spiritual issues (living one’s true life, not suppressing the true self, and various false beliefs one may have that block the full unfolding and development of one’s being). Any and all of these can be part of the complex of causes in a given case that produce the symptoms labelled fibromyalgia, and these are all examined and addressed in a systematic, comprehensive fashion. No two cases of fibromyalgia (or X, Y, Z condition) are the same. Yet the complex of causes underlying the condition in each case can be individually addressed.

True treatment for any condition involves identifying and then removing the underlying causes, using safe and effective remedies, whether to remove an imbalance in diet or lifestyle, or to remove a disease state, such as unresolved chronic grief or from a vaccination, such as for Rubella, as was a factor in one case of rheumatoid arthritis we treated. Heilkunst can offer that type of treatment.

For more information about Heilkunst treatment and studies please visit our website.

that there are certain archetypal disease patterns that we bring with us into the world?

Do you have one or more of these chronic problems: skin issues, low grade depression, a sense of there not being enough in the world, common acne, asthma, headaches, insomnia, allergies, colds, bronchitis, earaches? You likely are carrying around one of these archetypal patterns from birth, indeed the first one, called Psora. If so, treating the symptoms won’t get you much other than possibly some temporary relief, even if using herbs or dietary changes. Even treating for the secondary disease patterns as homeopathy won’t help that much. You need Heilkunst, which is the only approach I know of that can systematically address these inherited, archetypal disease patterns, and thus, get to the bottom of chronic, complex disease conditions.

Last week we talked about the chronic miasms in general. This week we’ll start to take a look at them in more detail. There are eight such archetypal disease patterns and they follow a particular sequence. There are four major ones and four ‘minor’ ones, just as in music we can have a major and a minor key. They follow the seasons roughly, but as each season is generally divided into an early and later part (early Spring and late Spring, etc.), we then really have eight ‘seasons’.

The first miasm to appear is termed, Psora. It was discovered by Dr. Hahnemann and traced back to the earliest recorded times through various skin manifestations, including leprosy. The word was taken from the Hebrew term ‘tsorat’, which had the meaning of a ‘fault’ or ‘error’. The two chief characteristics of Psora are dryness and skin eruptions, usually dry and scaly. The allopathic term ‘psoriasis’ for one of the many skin manifestations has the same etymological root. However, Psora covers a multitude of skin eruptions, as well as many other symptoms.

Although Dr. Hahnemann did not identify the origin of Psora, work by Dr. Batmangelidj on the chronic impact of dehydration suggests that this may have been the source of the emergence of the first chronic miasm. The nature of chronic miasms is that they can then, once acquired, be passed on from generation to generation.

Dr. Hahnemann also called Psora, the ‘mother of all chronic disease’ for two reasons. First, the other chronic miasms emerged from it, and second, because each of the chronic miasms also caused the emergence of secondary chronic diseases in a person. The chronic miasms are primary, fixed nature or tonic diseases, and they then give rise to any number of secondary, variable nature or pathic diseases over time in a given individual.

The symptoms of Psora are too numerous to list here, but it we can give an idea of the essence of the disease as it tends to manifest in people. Psora is mainly a disease of deficiency at all levels – deficiency of knowledge, thought, assimilation of ideas and nutrition. There are a host of conditions identified by the prefix “hypo” (hypotension, hypochondriasis, hypotrophy) associated with psora. It causes little or no structural change, but much disturbance of functions, feelings and sensations. It seems to involve largely the nervous and reticulo-endocrine systems of the organism.

The psoric state of mind feels it does not have enough (of anything, be it money, food, energy, love, warmth, etc.). You may be familiar with it if you know anyone who had to live through the Great Depression or a war. They may hoard food, toilet paper, rubber bands or twist ties, for no apparent reason other than, “You never know when you may need them.” The stereotypical street person illustrates this miasm well, when they are carrying with them every one of their possessions, while wearing virtually all of their clothing, including coats and hats, even in sweltering heat. It is not likely to manifest in such an extreme form in most of us, but the underlying traits will be there.

that there are inherited factors that affect our health that go beyond our genes?

Until recently, everything was either controlled by your genes or simply unexplainable. However, despite millions spent on mapping the human genome, it turns out that not only do we differ much from the common fruit fly when it comes to the number and types of genes, but most of the genes are not linked to anything in particular, and are known as ‘junk DNA’. Biology has begun to understand that genes are only receptors for something, like a radio receiver, namely, signals from the environment. These signals are not only physical, such as sunlight, air, water, food, but also thoughts and feelings. In many ways, we are and become what we eat, feel and think. Biology has also come around to accepting the idea prevalent at the start of the debate about evolution some two centuries ago, that we can inherit certain characteristics and influences that are not strictly connected to genes. In a real sense, we are more than what is contained ‘between our hat and our boots’.

In Heilkunst, the idea of inherited disease patterns was discovered by Dr. Samuel Hahnemann between 1812 – 1816, around the same time that the idea of inherited characteristics was proposed by Lamarck and others. Hahnemann spent over 12 years searching for the answer to a problem: despite the clear successes with homeopathy in removing diseases, he discovered that some patients continued to get worse overall. He felt that he was missing something. From diligent observation of his patients, he then discovered that there were certain fixed patterns that could be traced to birth, and also to various disease patterns their parents and even grandparents had exhibited. These were a peculiar kind of primary, constant nature (tonic) diseases.They also had an original infectious nature, once contracted could be passed on to one’s offspring, such as syphillis and gonorrhoea (which Hahnemann named sycosis). So, he termed them chronic miasms in contradistinction to the acute miasms (i.e. infectious diseases) such as scarlet fever, cholera, measles, etc. The passing of chronic miasms from one generation to another does not rely on a physical contact. This, we may consider, belongs to the “unexplainable” part that science hasn’t been able to understand. We may think that during evolution mankind as a whole has inherited some disease patterns from previous generations in a similar sense that we build our thinking and understanding of the world from the generations before us. Each generation or epoch leaves a legacy for the future generations. So, too, disease may be passed on, both in terms of natural diseases (e.g. tuberculosis, lyme disease) and spiritual diseases (e.g. false beliefs).

Miasms, chronic or acute, are primary, constant nature (tonic) diseases. Due to the fixed/constant nature of these diseases, there is a specific remedial agent or medicine for each one of them, which made them relatively easy to treat. However, the interaction between a given chronic miasm and the constitution of an individual produces various secondary disease patterns. These were more difficult to treat, as they varied according to each case. But fortunately, treating for the parent or chronic miasms seemed to remove many of the secondary diseases as well.

With his discovery of the chronic miasms, Hahnemann gave us the ability to treat for deep-seated, chronic, complex disease conditions that had roots in weaknesses that had little to do with the shocks and traumas of this life, but were there already at conception. The more of these inherited chronic disease patterns we had, the more likely that various shocks and traumas would destabilize us. Thus, as important as it is to remove the cumulative shocks and traumas, it is also critical in many cases to go past the point of conception and reach back into the various disease patterns we brought with us.

In our experience, many cases could not be helped without this monumental discovery of Dr. Hahnemann. We encountered many cases where people have tried many other approaches and have had little or no improvement. In the case of children on the autistic spectrum, they are labelled ‘non-responders’. I remember the first time I came across such a case. The doctors and even the natural health community had consistently thrown up their hands. Could Heilkunst do anything, the mother asked? I didn’t know for certain, but knowing that Heilkunst can treat diseases that no one else seems to see or know how to treat, I felt confident it could help at least to some degree. And it did! Since then we have been treating difficult, complex, chronic cases of all types – ones that others have given up on. I still recall one case where a woman did not respond to classical homeopathic treatment and was then told she was ‘incurable’. In tears she came to ask if this was indeed true. I told her that yes, by the tenets of classical homeopathy, this was indeed true, but fortunately, by the laws and principles of the complete medical system that Dr. Hahnemann gave us, Heilkunst, it was not. Her problems were resolved by treating for the shocks and traumas in her life and the inherited miasms.

Who would have thought that a discovery some two centuries ago, the chronic miasms, would be confirmed by the most recent scientific understandings in biology (epigenetics). Heilkunst has built in an effective way of treating for inherited disease patterns. In our next blogs we will look at each of the chronic miasms in more detail. Stay tuned.

For more information about Heilkunst treatment and studies please visit our website.

that we don’t necessarily come into this world in a completely healthy way? In fact, nowadays, the birthing process is often anything but natural or healthy, involving as it does a variety of interventions from drugs and surgical procedures (cesarians and other) for the moms to various pokings and proddings of the newborns. We are so accustomed to do what we are told, especially when we are in the hospital or in a crisis condition, which birthing seems to have been turned into, that we accept these interventions without questioning or relating the later illness or problems back to these procedures.

Our health is shaped by every experience around us. There is a lot that can happen from conception to birth that can affect our health. The very conditions of conception itself can create a certain stress. If there was fear or grief, or even anger and guilt in the parents, the mother in particular, this can possibly affect the baby. I know of one case in particular where a child was conceived in profound grief in both parents because of the death of the first-born only a few months before from a tropical infection. This induced a state of mind in the child throughout its life involving unresolved grief. A lot of the grief we carry around as adults might have been there from the very beginning. That is why in Heilkunst we look at all significant life events systematically from now back to birth and conception.

I had one case in particular where the child, about 3 years old, was always crying. Despite various attempts, nothing seemed to work. In further questioning the mother it was revealed that the child only cried when around the mother, but not with the father or anyone else. I noted that there likely had been some kind of emotional trauma early on at the time of conception or during pregnancy. Initially the mother could not identify one, but three days later called, and confessed that for the first week after she knew she was pregnant, she had not wanted the child, and briefly considered an abortion. We then treated the child for the shock of rejection and abandonment, and the crying stopped.

In another similar case, a baby of 18 months seemed not to respond to the mother’s voice, but was fine with the father. Knowing that ultrasounds can affect the hearing capacity of the fetus, and finding out that the mother had had several ultrasounds, we treated for this shock, and the baby now responded to the mother’s voice.

There are similar shocks that can occur from drugs taken by the mother during pregnancy, as well as from amniocentesis, and other interventions. The child is part of the mother’s energetic system while in the womb, and even for some time after, though increasingly less so as the child grows up.

Birth these days is often involved with various drugs, such as Pitocin to induce labour, lengthy labour, the use of forceps, spinal blocks, not to mention the often stressful conditions of a hospital, the too early cutting of the umbilical cord, the separation of mother and child, vaccinations such as Hepatitis B at birth, antibiotics in the eyes, the PKU test, C-sections, etc. While these may be necessary at times, they still constitute a potential shock to the mother and child. These interventions are often not taken into account when later the child or mom experiences problems such as breastfeeding difficulty, jaundice or various other problems of infancy, such as digestive issues, colic, constant crying, congestion, failure to thrive, ear-aches. We consider all these shocks and traumas in the timeline of life events that we treat for. When they are treated for early on, ideally right after, then the child can often avoid many of these problems.

Right from the early days, a child can already be carrying quite a burden of diseases induced by the various shocks and traumas mentioned, both emotional and physical. Heilkunst provides a way to recognize these shocks as contributing to or directly causing health issues, and to effectively and safely remove them. Homotonic and homeopathic medicines are non-toxic and safe for the mother and child throughout the pregnancy, labour and birth. There are also excellent remedies that can be given to help with labour and delivery, to avoid interventions that represent a potential shock to the child (and mother), and to help making the experience more pleasant and natural. Heilkunst is child-safe, child-friendly and supportive of healthy families. With Heilkunst, you can get your children off on the right foot in life, healthier and happier. Next week we’ll look at some issues that affect health that pre-date conception, what we call the chronic miasms or inherited disease patterns. Stay tuned.

For more information about Heilkunst treatment and studies please visit our website.